Wednesday, November 30, 2005

i'm a lifelong mets fan, through mostly bad and good, and i could not be any more excited about the prospects of 2006. not only did we get carlos delgado and billy wagner - thereby significantly upgrading our two weak areas - but we did so without touching our young nucleus of david wright, jose reyes and lastings milledge - and aaron heilman, if you want to include him, too.

that's so important and valuable, to have a plan and to follow through with it. plans elicit hope.

so i'm geeked about all this and i've even kept my schedule for next october completely free.

and then i read that our co-owner, jeff wilpon, who is widely considered to be a jackass, basically told delgado that he will not be able to continue with his personal protest against the war in iraq (and other things) by forcing him to stand during the national anthem.

by the way, i would say that forcing someone to do something just sounds so completely unamerican and against everything what we're fighting for over there, but then again, someone please explain to me again what the hell are we fighting for?

i don't disagree with having to follow the rules of your employee when they're paying you. but as long as you don't embarass yourself or the team, what harm is there in this? he's been nothing but classy and thoughful about it.

so wilpon, a white man, doesn't want to tell his puerto rican employee what to do or what to think, so he lies and tells that the order instead comes from a dominican general manager and his african-american manager.

sometimes, children are just bad and there's nothing anyone can do to change them. and then, in some instances, the finger should be pointed squarely at their parents because their offspring just didn't have a chance.

like this charming chap. what else did you expect him to do? win a nobel prize? cure cancer?

even though it's not an exact match, the parents who named this child should be arrested and put in a cell with the parents of LA dodger outfielder and famous hothead milton bradley.

Monday, November 28, 2005

seriously, as much as i'm angry with him is how confident i am with my giants. going into seattle where they don't lose, playing basically 11-on-12 against an impossibly loud crowd, and still manhandling them and basically beating them three times, well, i'd rather have the W, but there's no doubt who'd win if we played them again.

Friday, November 25, 2005

when someone says "you resemble someone", it doesn't mean that you're an exact match. it just means that there's something about you that reminds them of that person.

but when someone says "you're like a twin", well, that says everything.

the reason i bring this up is because i found this website with celebrity lookalikes, except most of them look nothing like who they're imitating, and it made me laugh at how some people want to believe anything.

at the very least, self-delusion can get you onto this website. good for them.

Wednesday, November 23, 2005

things i saw or noticed during my alaska airlines flight from san francisco to seattle on tuesday morning:

1. everyone should fly north to seattle or vancouver at least once. you know when you fly over the rockies, and you're kinda amazed by the unending mountains with jagged edges? well, you get that, along with these huge mountains and volcanoes that suspensefully shoot up from the already raised ground. i'm talking about mount hood and the three sisters and mount saint helena and on and on and on. it really feels like one of them is gonna trip the plane.

2. from the air mag: the city of edmonton has 900,000 residents. i seriously had no idea. i need to catch up with my relevance of canadian cities.

3. the color white of clouds is not as vivid as the color white of snow. (of course, best if viewed from above them both).

4. the soul patch that my male flight attendant grew has to be the last act of a desperate man.

Monday, November 21, 2005

i know i've blogged before at how stupid businesses and corporations are when they buy the naming rights to a venue or whatnot. they have every right to do so; they should just show a little taste and put their name after it. my point being that nobody cares about corporate sponsorship except for the corporations. to everyone else, it's another annoyance in the world. but corporations are just too arrogant to see that.

i just confused myself.

okay, try this: it shouldn't be called "the doritos tostida fiesta bowl". nobody gives a crap about doritos tostidas. if corporations had any taste, it would be named "the fiesta bowl, brought to you by doritos tostida" because doritos tostida has nothing to do with the fiesta bowl.

it should always be "this thing" presented by "this company".

the point is to leave things alone. bless you for sponsoring it, but get out of the way. it ain't about you and your branding. as is the industry standard, when you leave it to a corporation to make a decision, they can't help themselves.

but now it's gotten out of hand.

the navy midshipmen football team just won an invitation to play in the inaugural poinsettia bowl. it ain't the sugar or the rose or fiesta or orange or the cotton. it's a poinsettia bowl. unfortunately, the people who named the bowls found the most feminine name ever.

i was gonna post something about how "the madden curse" has reared its ugly head again and, considering all my pain and suffering, how it makes me laugh hysterically, but darren rovell at espn beat me to it.

when my roommate JR moved out last weekend, not only did i lose one of my best friends, but also quite possibly the best collection of vinyl records ever.

of course, i built my own collection as well, only buying records from artists that i think would sound better on the rawness and scratchiness that a needle provides. basically, albums that sound the way you hear music inside a crowded smoke-filled small theater. so i have a bunch already.

the others, i miss.

do not shed a tear. i was walking around noe valley today and found streetlight records, which has an amazing selection. i never knew this place existed. maybe they just opened up for me, knowing my plight and sudden lack of coolness.

$75 later, and i'm back being cool again somewhat.

here are my new additions which, in reality, are just replacements (except not in a few cases):

after about a full decade of failed attempts that involved rumors attaching nicolas cage, charlie sheen, keanu reeves or brendan fraser as the star and brett ratner, j.j. abrams, mcg or wolfgang peterson behind the camera, finally, a friggin' trailer for the new "superman" movie is out, starring some unknown guy as the man of steel but directed by bryan singer (and there's no bettter choice to do this than him).

after my recent stint as juror #1 in a sexual battery case, i have a newfounded disrespect and downright hatred for lawyers - and it's well earned. i'm not saying all lawyers should be grouped together in that ball of fire, but the ones that tried the case were horrific on so many levels, and whenever you hear about lawyers in the news, good rarely comes of it.

anyway, netflix just got sued by a customer who claimed that netflix lies when it says you can get "unlimited" rentals in a month when, if you figure in shipment times, you can really only get about 10 a month, give or take.

okay, that's semantics. i guess that makes them liable. whatever.

plus they complained that the more you rent, the longer the turnaround.

okay, that's conjecture. again, liable.

to avoid all this semantics and conjecture, netflix wound up settling out of court.

so for all of netflix's customers, everyone receives one free month of a rental upgrade - so if you get three movies at once, now you get four for a month, and after that month, you have to notify them that you don't want the upgrade. i hate when you have to do that, but okay.

that seems like a nice little pot o'gold for customes that have been "duped".

that is, until you find out that the lawyers who tried the case against netflix won $2.5 million.

what????

okay, that's completely unacceptable and clearly indicative of how manipulative this culture and society has been made by lawyers who seek their own profit rather than finding the common good and fairness. it's capitalizing, not capitalism.

Wednesday, November 16, 2005

i don't know how trey parker and matt stone do it. they rip paris hilton and others so brutally that you would have to think that the "south park" and comedy central lawyers were contacted by other lawyers and threats were made. had to. i can't see any other way they get away with what they do - and god bless them.

anyway, they've been scot-free. but i have a feeling that's gonna change with this week's episode "trapped in the closet", which is about tom cruise and john travolta, who are...yeah, i don't have to complete that sentence.

and, to top it all off, it completely rips apart scientology purely by letting scientology rip itself apart.

then again, maybe they won't get sued. there might just be enough loopholes in the storytelling.

1. while waiting on line to order food, absolutely do not pay attention to the menu that's displayed right above you in clear view or to the long line standing behind you.

2. when you get to the cashier to order, take your dear sweet time deciding what you want, and also ask questions about particular items on the menu. this whole step should take up to three full minutes.

3. finally decide on an item. no wait! you want this one instead. and watch the cashier cancel the order with a new one. always fun for the next person on line.

4. stand there like an idiot as the cashier gives you the price, and then spend a good minute digging through your purse for your wallet.

5. give your credit card for a $5 purchase. if you're lucky, it won't go through the first time. then sign your full name in a perfect little script. maybe even dot your eyes with a smiley face.

scene: you're driving down a road just west of philadelphia where the street signs are the size of dental floss. you're looking for maple, and you think you've passed elm and main, but you're not sure - your eyesight isn't 20/20, and it's dark out. so you turn on your navtones and enter "maple". and then clubber lang/bad attitude baracus tells you what to do.

Tuesday, November 15, 2005

when john mccollom shot himself while listening to "suicide solution", the media and the religious right quickly blamed ozzy osbourne. i mean, it made perfect sense. he wanted his fans to kill themselves.

when the trenchcoat mafia did the unthinkable in columbine, the religious right blamed the killers' favorite band - marilyn manson. it's very obvious from the lyrics of "freak show" that he endorsed a massacre in a high school.

and god knows that rap music has been blamed for everything in the recent years, from pimping and killing for drugs and whoring out women (okay, actually, they might actually do those things, but it's not meant to be taken literally).

the religious right knows all this, because they've got a personal relationship with jesus and he's not happy about these influences. hey, it's the music's fault and not the fact that there are stupid and crazy people in the world.

quite simply, rather than blaming people, it's easier to accuse music and the musicians who put these evil thoughts in their head.

i show you the car, open the hood, give you a quick rundown. you take it for a short test drive, and it runs well enough. i show you some paperwork about how it had some minor work done, some receipts, all the inspection notices, and it meets to your approval. you purchase the car as is, without a chance of returning it.

and it dies on you an hour later.

you then return to me and complain that i sold you a lemon. but i tell you that i didn't, that you saw all my paperwork and how was i supposed to know that the car was a lemon? everything pointed to it being a solidly working vehicle. and it's true. it does.

privately you fume, because you saw everything i showed you, and it all made sense. dumb luck, i guess.

you take the car into a shop to get it fixed, and the mechanic recognizes it, and begins to tell you about all the major work that was done to it, and how he never would have bought this piece of crap. you ask him if you're sure. he says hell yeah, this car had no business being on the road. you ask to see the paperwork - and there it is, all the information you wish you had when you bought it, all conveniently withheld.

so you confront me with all this paperwork that i had but didn't show you, and instead of owning up to it, i lie and say that you had all the information in my possession, and that there was unmistakeable evidence that the car was in solid working condition, and that your decision was yours to make.

but with this mountain of receipts from the mechanic, you prove that i withheld all the other paperwork about how it shouldn't be on the road and that i only showed you the information that supported my theory that the car was working.

i tell you that you had no qualms before, and that's what counts.

which clearly means that you spoke the truth then, and you're speaking politics now.

Sunday, November 13, 2005

like i said before, whenever i hear something i think is funny on the telly, i'm gonna post it under a heading that says "how to make me laugh". that's the way i'm gonna roll for now on. you best believin'.

and now, for our second installment:

on "late night with conan o'brien", he mentioned during his monologue that the big christmas tree finally arrived to rockefeller center directly from new jersey. but before they can decorate it, they're gonna have to remove its giant track suit.

also on "conan", he mentioned that michael jackson said that he would like to live in the middle east one day, so take that, terrorists.

i read online today that WWE great eddie guerrero passed away this weekend in his hotel room. he was 38.

now, whatever your thoughts are about professional wrestlers, you have to admit that what they do is entertainment - much like movie stars or singers or athletes - and when a star falls, it's pretty big news. eddie guerrero was a star. it's big news. msnbc thought so.

he was great. and there aren't many pro wrestlers around you can say that about now.

anyway, WWE head honcho vince mcmahon held a press conference, where he said, "it will be tough to get over, but eddie would want the show to go on, and that's what we're going to try to do tonight."

here's my question: how does he know eddie would want the show to go on? was it written somewhere? did he mention it to his nephew over denny's one morning? why is that assumed? was it his last words? if it were, would you believe he really meant it? i mean, he's probably not thinking right at that moment.

or is the idea to find a bit of normalcy in this, to just keep things status quo? but it's not status quo. mcmcahon said that tonight's raw and smackdown will both be dedicated to eddie guerrero and that "you'll see the human beings, not so much as performers, but friends of eddie," the shows will include highlights of eddie's career. so it wouldn't be anything like the shows that normally air - so not the status qup.

oh. so he would want the show to go on, but not the show that he was expecting, but another show, one that praises him and causes everyone to cry? sure about that?

okay, i'm being a dick. but i just hate it when people assume what others are thinking, especially when the others are dead, and then act on it like it's all the justification they need. i'm sure the show will be very classy and if i watch it, i'm sure i will get teary eyed. and i'm sure it will be a fitting tribute worthy of the fallen star.

but don't say it's what he wanted. you don't know.

then again, vince mcmahon wanted the show to go on when one of his performers, owen hart, fell from the rafters and died in the middle of the ring during a pay-per-view.

Thursday, November 10, 2005

Fox may not be killing Arrested Development, but it’s stabbing it in the gut, rolling it out of the passenger side door, and leaving it for dead by the side of the road. Variety reports that Fox is pulling the show from the schedule during sweeps (along with Kitchen Confidential, but we doubt its fans will be sending any foam Hail Marys to save it), and has reduced its order from 22 to 13 episodes.

i mean, why not? getting it off the air makes perfect sense. the show has only won a trainload of emmys.

well, if it's gotta be, it's gotta be. for some odd reason, people aren't watching it enough to warrant its space on the network and the high advertising rates. but it's only to be replaced by some slop that wouldn't bring in any more than what AD carries. i can't believe there isn't a space in fox's lineup where the show's built-in audience would topple whatever's playing there at the time. i mean, this is the network of "stacked".

call me a fan, sure, and maybe i'm deluding myself that part of what is entertainment is putting shows on the air that, well, entertain. but that's a delusion; movie companies and television networks care more about advertising rates than artistic integrity. so this is just one small man looking for a reason to keep its brilliance on the air. it's so difficult to have genius writing, directing and acting at the same time, week after week. there's so few of them that earn my attention.

but then again, i'm just hoping HBO or showtime realizes how retarted fox is and picks up the show. and make fox look retarted. did i just say that it would make fox look retarted? i should, because it would.

Wednesday, November 09, 2005

i am completely unfocused right now - which is ironic, because i just did bikram yoga this morning and it's supposed to help you concentrate.

so here's a posting full of nonsense.

the penultimate scene in this week's "arrested development", where george michael flies in on a jetpak near tobias who is dressed like a godzilla-like mole as he accidentally destroys a tiny town in front of japanese investors, was one of the funniest things i have ever seen - and i've watched it three times already. hell, it was funny just to write it. if you're not on board with the show, you really need to be. they just released season #2. catch up.

if you didn't vote yesterday, you're still allowed to complain about the country, but you need to understand that since you did nothing about it when it mattered, your arguments hold less weight than someone who did. like me.

it's taken over a year for the good meaning people of the great state of california to realize that electing a bodybuilder/ action hero as governor might have been a bad idea. which reminds me of a great t-shirt i saw that read "don't blame me. i voted for gary coleman". i voted for the porn star.

okay, i didn't vote for her. but at least i made it to the polls that day.

the new rolling stones album is seriously good. it's more bluesy than what they've done recently - and that's a great thing. and it's a far departure from "bridges to babylon", which i also enjoyed but felt more like a dust brothers produced album than something from mick, keith, ron and charlie. this sounds more like "sticky fingers", which i think is their best (and not "exile on main street", which is universally acclaimed as their "abbey road"). but i digress.

now that the heavyweight champion of the world has retired from boxing with a torn ACL, can i claim that i am tougher than him? i mean, i only retired from competitive basketball after my first ACL. i still played - badly and whitely. i didn't retire for good after ACL #2. i don't think i'll see vitali klitschko boxing for fun anytime soon. so yeah, i am tougher. that's how i roll.

john stewart said that "terrell owens was suspended from the philadelphia eagles basically for being a dick." who said there's no truth and humor in blunt honesty?

and that comes on the heels of the baseball writers awarding the cy young award to bartolo colon. mind you, the cy young award goes to the best pitcher in the american league. so colon got it, even though he ranked 8th in ERA, 7th in innings, 3rd in WHiP, 8th in strikeouts and 10th in complete games.

whereas johan santana ranked 2nd in ERA, 1st in WHiP, 2nd in innings and 1st in strikeouts, among others.

so who is clearly the better pitcher?

well, bartolo colon had 22 wins, while santana had only 16. so colon is therefore better.

what?

the reason colon had 6 more wins than santana was not based upon his pitching; rather, his bullpen never blew a save in any of his games, and his offense garned 6 runs a game for him. don't believe me? here's some more from baseballprospectus.com:

Colon got 6.02 runs per game of support, a figure that was seventh in the league among ERA qualifiers. Santana got 4.70 runs per game, 30th in the league. That's 1.32 runs per game of support--stuff the pitcher has no control over, that's effectively the luck of the draw--that went Colon's way rather than Santana's. That's why Colon won the Cy Young Award, and why Santana finished third: because in 2005, the voting pool for the award can't see past the "W" column to look at the actual pitching.

so they gave an award for the best pitcher in the league not based on pitching but on support and offense. smart thinking there.

and i haven't even broached that mariano rivera actually deserved to win.

idiots.

plus, on top of all that, since the comissioner's office and the player's union failed to come together with a steroid plan by the end of the world series as promised, congress has quickly put together a bill to suspend steroid abusers a half year for their first offense, a year for their second and a lifetime ban for the third. good job again, baseball.

while riding the N-Judah this morning, i sat across from two men: one who looked like gary busey and another who looked like nick nolte. i'm not saying spitting images, but enough where i thought, "hey, that guy looks like..." and i did that twice.

busey and nolte. nolte and busey. i made a short film about how messed up those two are, and incidentally, how much they look alike.

can you tell the difference? me neither. does it matter? should we care?

about these two normal folk on the train, however, they were not friends, and they were not together. they just were spitting images of them.

aaaanyway, they both got off at the civic center station.

for those not in the know, people who get off at the civic center usually are:1. working for the government.2. attending a concert.3. scoring some drugs.4. selling some drugs.5. going to rehab.

they weren't dressed for work, and it was waaaaay too early for a concert.

which means...

okay, i'm not making fun of them. people get themselves into those conditions. i just think it's very funny that they look like gary busey and nick nolte, and they're the way they are.

i don't know if any of you have noticed it, but there seems to be this e-mail advertising thing that's set up that sends a comment to my post whenever i write one. they usually begin with "hey, great blog!" and then it goes on to talk about how their blog is about condo rentals in san diego or penis enlargement or something that has nothing to do what i've written.

it's an automatic reply. and it's annoying.

so it's time to do something about it.

over the next week or so, i will write quite possibly the most offensive post i've ever written - and may have ever been written. it will be vile and disgusting and morally repulsive. it will make anyone who reads it scream with hatred and disgust.

i just want to write about something so completely abhorrent and have a comment that says "hey! i agree with you! great blog! you should check out mine about aluminum siding!"

1. sign a contract that you feel is undervalued.2. complain about it.3. threaten to hold out of training camp.4. call out your quarterback, who happens to be the franchise's cornerstone.5. show up at training camp, but then get suspended for a week.6. be a general nuisance in your dressing room.7. complain about an injury that might keep you out for a couple of weeks, but then practice the next day.8. complain about your employer in an interview by selfishly bitching about not being recognized for an individual achievement, and throw your injured-but-valiant quarterback under a bus for good measure.9. get into a fight with the team's ambassador.10. call out the rest of the team, including the quarterback.11. issue a lame public apology but not for the quarterback.12. get suspended for the season, forfeiting four weeks pay.13. reinforce your reputation as the worst teammate in the history of organized sports.

i'm about as open-minded as it comes, and i think that helps me be as knowledgeable as i possibly can. and i believe strongly that everyone should force themselves to see both sides of a issue in order to truly know how to judge it.

but seriously, if one side is complete bullshit and cockamamie, is it worth even considering? wouldn't that be a waste of time?

isn't that the last thing we should be wasting in our schools?

shouldn't time be spent studying things that can be proven?

what i'm saying is that it's not the theory of intelligent design that pisses me off. hell, people can delude themselves however they see fit. but don't waste time in our schools teaching unproveable heebie-jeebies unless there's a course called "unproveable heebie-jeebies". otherwise, it's a waste of time.

the scariest thing about that article is that "six of the 10 board members have previously endorsed language sought by advocates of intelligent design, a theory that says the universe is so complex it must have been created by a higher force", despite the tons of evidence - and i mean tons - for evolution and the complete lack of evidence towards "intelligent design", like "who created the creator?"

so the people charged with educating need their own educating. i weep for kansas.

but why stop there? here's some other things that should also be taught:

- rain is actually god crying.

- night happens when god turns out the lights.

- kansas is flat because god hates tits.

- electricity is made when god walks and drags his socked feet over a carpet.

- sneezes are god's way of pulling a practical joke.

why not believe that? it's just as plausible as anything else the religious right will have you believe.

Friday, November 04, 2005

- they're only playing out this season to see if tim duncan gets hurt. if he don't, the spurs are gonna win this easily. if he does, all bets are off.

- the milwaukee bucks are gonna be damn good, and everyone's gonna fall in love with t.j. ford again. that guy can run the point. he's the next jason kidd, but different.

- ron artest ain't gonna keep it together.

- rabid fans will urge that david stern install and enforce a dress code on craig sager.

- this might be a long year for the knicks, but it would be for the better. stephon marbury is not a point guard, but he might make a great two-guard. nobody gets to the hoop like he does, and obviously there's great value in that. jamal crawford, for all his wonderful gifts, doesn't add anything. under larry brown, he should be nothing more than a spot-up shooter. eddy curry's gonna be fun to watch. anyways, they're all gonna learn how to play the right way, and additions will be made, and by the end of this year, they're gonna be fun to watch. but right now, it's painful. they're not playing; they're thinking. and that's not easy on the eyes.

Thursday, November 03, 2005

i think i saw the best accordion player ever, and his name is corn mo.

he was great. he played songs about sandwiches and about his friend who got peed on in sixth grade. yeah, doesn't sound so great now as i type it, but he put on a great show full of realy funny ramblings and completely odd songs. he puts on a great one-man show, worth a trip if he ever comes your way. i'm glad i had the opportunity.

and, most importantly, he was a perfect opener for they might be giants, who completely rocked.

it was a really strange crowd - i mean, there were there to see they might be giants, who are just strange to begin with - but it was still kinda cool (i think) to enjoy them with a crowd full of people who don't get out much (and that's probably for the best).

you know, nerds watching nerds, which i guess, in turn, makes me a...

whatevs.

on a quick side note: this morning, i watched a piece of "revenge of the nerds iv: nerds in love". it was complete dreck that really couldn't get any worse. they really should have stopped right after #2 and the genius hotel coral essex scene.

but i digress. back to the nerds at hand.

anyways, they might be giants are known mostly for their song "boss of me" which is the opening theme song to "malcolm in the middle". but in my world, they're known for their really cool insightful lyrics - like these:

from "ana ng":When I was driving once I saw this painted on a bridge:I don’t want the world, I just want your halfThey don’t need me here, and I know you’re there Where the world goes by like the humid air And it sticks like a broken recordEverything sticks like a broken recordEverything sticks until it goes away And the truth is, we don’t know anything

and from "the end of the tour":At the end of the tourWhen the road disappearsIf there's any more people aroundWhen the tour runs agroundAnd if you're still aroundThen we'll meet at the end of the tourThe engagements are booked through the end of the worldSo we'll meet at the end of the tour

okay, so this posting was just an excuse to copy-and-paste these lyrics here. so sue me.

you're probably gonna have to install flash 8 and, to be honest, this website ideally works great on a fast computer. then again, why wouldn't it? it's a racing game. but once you get that all figured out, start the engine and don't look back.